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The publication of this Address has been delayed for the Committee to 
obtain materials for a History of the Town, which is designed to accom- 
pany it, and is now in press. 

A few copies are presented in a separate fonn for the use of friends, in 
fulfilment of a promise made tliem by the author. 

Cambiidye, March 20, 1S50. 



,-1 < 



i^' 



'^( 



AN 



ORATION 

DELIVERED AT MALDEN, 

ON THE 

TWO PIUNDEEDTH ANNIYERSARY 



INCORPORATION OF THE TOWN, 



MAY 23, 1849. 



BY JAMES D. GREEN 



PUBLISHED BY REQUEST OF THE TOWN 



BOSTON: 
PRINTED BY GEO. C. RAND & CO. 

NO. 3 CORNHILL. 
1850. 



f1^ 



M 



ORATION. 



Friends and Fellow Citizens : 

It accords -well -with the best feelings of our nature to 
meet, as we do to-day, to commemorate our Fathers. 
Two hundred years ago they laid here the " first founda- 
tion stones" of the town of Maiden. Such is the expres- 
sion of Edward Johnson, of Woburn, who, in his " History 
of New England," published in London in 1G54,* says, 
that these foundation stones were " laid by certain per- 
sons who issued out of Charlestown ; and, indeed," he 
adds, Maiden " had her whole structure within the bounds 
of this more elder town, being severed, by the broad spread- 
ing river of Mistick, the one from the other, whose trouble- 
some passage caused the people on the north side of the 
river to plead for town privileges within themselves ; — 
which accordingly was granted them." The brief record of 
what may be regarded as the act of incorporation by the 
General Court is as follows : "In answer to the petition of 
several inhabitants of Mistick side, their request is granted, 
viz. to be a distinct town of themselves, and the name 
thereof to be Maulden." 

It is no unreasonable presumption, that it was for the 
purpose of being reminded here, in what was then a wil~ 

* Chap. vii. p. 211, 



(lerncss, of that si)ot in the parent country from ■\\hich 
they had removed, and which now lay three thousand 
miles behind them, that the early settlers of this town gave 
to it the name of ^laldcn. 

It is the name of a town in England, in the county of 
Essex, about thirty-eight miles from London, which, if we 
take the authority of Camden as our guide,* is identical with 
the ancient Camalodunum, once the capital of Cunobeline, 
a powerful old British king, and the seat of the first Ro- 
man colony in the Island. About the middle of the first 
century, it was made by the Emperor Claudius a place of 
great magnificence and beauty. The monuments, how- 
ever, of Roman grandeur, by which it Avas distinguished, 
being, in the eyes of the native Britons, monuments of 
their subjection, were suffered by them to be of no long 
continuance. They were utterly demolished by the peo- 
ple, when they rose to throw oif the Roman yoke ; and 
the English Maiden of the present day, though a town of 
some importance, is said to retain few or no vestiges of 
its ancient renown. 

The affections of the first planters of New England still 
clung, as was natural, to the soil of their nativity. They 
gave utterance, at parting, to the emotions of the heart, 
Avhen they said, " farewell, dear England ; " and they 
designed, by the names they bestowed on the places of 
their abode, in this land of their adoption, to keep alive in 
their breasts the tender associations of home. 

Of the first settlers of this town I now address many of 
the lineal descendants. As I turn the leaves of the early 
records, and read there, continually occurring, such names 
a.s mil, AVait, Spraguc, Sargent, Lynde, Howard, Nichols, 

* Cuimleii'.s Britannia, edit. 1772, Vol. I. i>. 353. 



Upliam, Dexter, Tufts, Pratt, Bucknam, vrith my own, and 
others too numerous to mention, I see that the original 
families have sent down their representatives ; that their 
sons and daughters are still living here, — constituting, I 
know not what proportion, but probably a large majority, 
of the present population of the town. 

Thus descended, it would be strange, indeed, did we 
not feel an interest in the inquiry. Who were our fathers ? 
and Why did they come to settle here ? 

In pursuing this inquiry a reasonable curiosity will find 
enough to satisfy it. No cloud of uncertainty envelopes 
the subject. As a people, a constituent part of a com- 
monwealth, or a community of nations, we have not to go 
back for our origin to a j^-iod of ignorance and semi-bar- 
barism, when there were no letters, no records, but such 
as existed in the memory of uncivilized men, — vague and 
varying traditions handed down from father to son, through 
successive generations. We have our literal records, — 
family, town, and state records, — of all transactions in- 
teresting and important. Some of the leading founders 
of the colony kept a minute journal of occurrences from 
day to day. Such was kept by John Winthrop, the Father 
of the colony, from the time of his embarkation on board 
the Arbella, " riding at the Cowes, near the Isle of 
Wight," to 16-19, the year when Maiden took its place 
among the towns of the rising State. 

To go further back, — no obscurity hangs over the ori- 
gin of that great movement of the public mind, in England, 
which led, in the early part of the seventeenth century, 
first to the colonization of this country, and next to the 
establishment at home of the constitutional and parlia- 



6 

nicntary rights of the people. It forms a portion of history 
so written as never to be expunged. 

Our Fathers were Puritans. Let this be the enduring 
record of their fame. They were a chiss of men never to 
1)C spoken of but witli honor, for what they have done and 
suffered for the human race. They constituted a class, to 
whom we may aii[)ly the language of IMacaulay,* and 
say they were " men of generous natures," who made it 
" a point of conscience and of honor," " to sacrifice their 
country to their religion." Nay, more, they believed it a 
call of God, to sacrifice their lives to their religion. The 
first martyrs to the English Reformation, — Rogers, who 
was burned at Smithfield, in the reign of Mary, and 
Hooper, who was burned at Gl(^cster, — were both Puri- 
tans. So were Barrow and Greenwood, who, though pro- 
fessing, like the other Puritans, their loyalty to Elizabeth, 
were hanged at Tyburn. They Avere a class of men, who 
made no compromise between duty and policy, between 
conscience and expediency. It was no half-way reform, 
as was aimed at by the English prelacy, but a " root and 
branch" operation, which they thought needed, to cure 
the disorders of the Church and State. 

Many of them had been in Germany and Switzerland, 
that they might breathe a freer and a purer air, and there 
they held sweet communion Avith brethren in the faith. 
Emancipated from the s^nritual authority of Rome, pro- 
foundly venerated as it had been for its anti(]uity, and its 
claims to a direct apostolic succession, it Avas not to have 
been expected that they Avould bow in submission to a 
mere assumption of that authority, — an upstart and mock 
supremacy, Avhich thoy had themselves seen usurped for 

* History of Englaiul, Biillci'.s Pliil. edit., Vol. I., p. 52. Sec note A. 



no other purpose, at the time, than the gratification of 
a selfish Sovereign's sensuality. 

The power of tlie throne being applied to uphold the 
supremacy of the English church, and to compel uniformity 
of faith and practice, it was by the operation of causes 
perfectly natural that Puritans became Republicans. In 
defiance of all the constitutional safeguards for the protec- 
tion of the British subject, the Star-Chamber and High 
Commission Courts were made the instruments of oppres- 
sion. Oppression did but increase their number. Sir 
Walter Raleigh announced in Parliament, in 1593, that 
the Puritans were not less in number than twenty thou- 
sand.* In 1604, King James I. declared, " I will make 
them conform, or I will harry them out of the land."! 
And, under Charles I., who is said to have been " im- 
pelled by an incurable propensity to dark and crooked 
ways,":|: and who ventured on the hazardous experiment 
of governing for eleven years without a parliament, a 
tyranny was established, both in the State and Church, to 
which the Spanish Inquisition affords the only parallel. 

Hunted up by search warrants, deprived of their livings, 
hundreds thrown into prison, their families made dependent, 
their own lives at the mercy of a tribunal, whose forms of 
proceeding were guided by the will of a vindictive primate 
in defiance of all law, large numbers of the Puritans made 
up their minds to bid a final farewell to England. Of 
them were many, who had been educated in the Universi- 
ties ; ministers, who, in learning, were not excelled by any 
in the land ; merchants possessed of wealth ; some who 
were of noble birth, and accustomed to the refinements of 

* Neal's History of the Puritans, Vol. I. p. 516. 
t Ibid, Vol. II. p. 44. t Macaulay, Vol. I. p. 67. 



8 

the best society ; tlio _^^cat body of them intcUigciit and 
substantial yeomen, possessing, if not nobility of title, 
wliat is of infinitely greater worth, true nobility of soul ; 
and all " stout-hearted and God-fearing men. " In 
tI»oir conceptions of liberty, civil and religious, they were 
far in advance of their age. They came to these shores 
to enjoy, unmolested, their religion ; to found in this wil- 
derness a Christian Commonwealth, in which every voter 
should be a freeman, and every freeman a church-member. 
Their souls swelled with the great idea. Difficulty, dan- 
ger, loss of country, perils by sea, an untried climate, and 
savage foes, all were of small account in the minds of men, 
who believed they were called of God to plant the church 
in the wilderness, and who felt inspired by the conscious- 
ness, a3 if from " some superior instinct," that they and 
their posterity were destined to be free. 

In IGOG, by letters patent from the king, James I., two 
companies of merchants, with some gentlemen and knights, 
had obtained a grant of all that portion of North America, 
which lay between the 34th and 45th parallels of latitude, 
and extended from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. 
Tliis continent .being then almost wholly unexplored, no 
idea had been formed in any mind approximating to the 
magnitude of the grant. The object of the crown was 
the extension of British sovereignty, and, of the two corpo- 
rations, sales of land warrants, and colonization for purposes 
of trade. Under one of these companies the first colony 
was planted in Virginia, in 1G07, with a result but little 
answering to the expectation. Other attempts, successively 
made, proved entirely abortive. A higher than any mere 
worldly object was necessary for a successful colonization 
of the country. 



The first company of Pilgrims, who came over in the 
Mayflower, in 1620, had obtained a patent from the Vir- 
ginia company, but coming further to the North than the 
limits of the company extended, further even than they 
themselves designed, no benefit accrued to them from the 
patent. Arrived within the Cape, and embraced by its 
extended arm, they " solemnly and mutually, in the pres- 
ence of God and of one another, covenant and combine " 
themselves "together into a civil body politic, " for the 
better attainment of their ends, and for the enactment of 
" such just and equal laws, as shall be most meet for the 
general good." They entered into a compact of govern- 
ment, which forms, in the judgment of Mr. Justice Story,* 
" if not the first, at least the best authenticated case of an 
original social contract for the establishment of a nation, 
Avhich is to be found in the annals of the world." It was 
a practical realization of what till then had been a pleasing 
philosophic theory. Having signed this voluntary com- 
pact, they proceeded to explore the coast, landed, and 
erected, in haste, their rude habitations in the midst of 
winter ; and, in afibctionate remembrance of the town in 
their native covintry, from which they last departed, they 
gave to the place the name of Plymouth. Thus was 
planted by the Puritan Pilgrims the first colony in New 
England. 

The settlement of the JNIassachusetts Colony, to which 
our ancestors belonged, was a few years later. Encouraged 
by the success of the Plymouth Colony, and their exemp- 
tion from the persecution which was still carried on at 
home with unrelenting severity, they made application' to 
the Northern corporation, and obtained a grant, in 1628, 

* Commentaries on tlie Constitution, Vol. I. p. 37. 
2 



10 

of all the territory which is included between two lines, 
drawn, the one three miles south of Charles river, and 
the other three miles north of the Merrimack, and extend- 
ing from sea to sea. The next year a charter was obtained 
from the crown, confirming the grant, creating the asso- 
ciates a body politic, and giving them, — was it not in an 
unguarded moment on the part of Charles ? — powers of 
government, and liberties and privileges most ample. 
Matthew Cradock was chosen by the company their first 
Clovernor, and the certificate of his oath of oflBce appended 
to the charter. 

A small company, under the intrepid Endicott, had 
been sent over to begin the plantation at Nahumkeik, now 
Salem, and make preparations for the settlement of the 
Colony. Several persons,* with his consent, travelled 
through the woods about twelve miles in a westerly direc- 
tion, and, coming to a neck of land, called Mishawum, 
between the Charles and the Mystic rivers, which was 
" full of Indians, called Aberginians ; " they obtained con- 
sent of their Sagamore and settled there. Soon after, 
they gave to the place of their settlement the name of 
Charlestown. 

A second company of about three hundred and fifty 
persons, in six vessels, with one hundred and fifteen head 
of cattle, also, cannon, small arras, and ammunition, and 
all the necessaries for a settlement, soon followed Endicott 
to Salem. Several ministers of eminence and piety came 
over in this company. About one third of the whole num- 
ber proceeded to Charlestown. 

Meanwhile a measure was resolved on by the corpora- 
tion in England, which was of the utmost importance to 
* Sec Note B. 



11 

the Colony. The Royal Charter gave full legislative and 
executive authority, not to the emigrants in Massachusetts, 
but to the Company in England, who would thus exercise 
the whole power of government over the Colony, three 
thousand miles distant. From this mode of administering 
affairs but little benefit could be expected. The question 
therefore presented itself, — it was conceived and magnani- 
mously proposed by Cradock himself,* — and, upon the best 
legal advice, it was decided, Aug. 29, 1629, to transfer 
the charter with the emigrants, in other words, to consti 
tute the Colony itself the company possessing full powers 
of government from the crown. On this condition, " sev- 
eral gentlemen of figure and estate," such as John 
Winthrop, Thomas Dudley, Isaac Johnson, Sir Richard 
Saltonstall, " and divers others, who were dissatisfied with 
the arbitrary proceedings both in church and state,"f had 
signified their purpose to emigrate ; and this purpose they 
now carried into execution. 

At a meeting of the company, held Oct. 20th, Cradock 
being too old to emigrate, $ John Winthrop was elected 
Governor, with a deputy, and eighteen assistants, and 
preparations were hastened for a large embarkation. 
Fifteen hundred persons, in seventeen ships, § fitted out 
at an expense of more than £ 21,000 sterling, passed 
over the Atlantic in 1630, most of them in company with 
Winthrop and the charter, to settle in Massachusetts Bay. 
Of these emigrants how just is the description given by 
Bancroft, in his History of the United States ! " Many of 

* Prince's New England Chronology, p. 189, sq. 

t Hutchinson's Hist. Mass., Vol. I. p. 12. Hutchinson's Coll, p. 25, sq. 

t Modem Universal Hist., Vol. XXXIX. p. 279. 

4 Prince says twelve. Chronology, p. 240. sq. 



12 

tlicm ^vcl•e ineii of hi.^li endowments, large fortune, and the 
best ('(lucatiun ; scholars Avell versed in all the learning of 
the times ; clergymen -who ranked among the most eloquent 
and pious in the realm." " The land "svas planted with a 
noble vine, wholly of the right seed. Religion did not 
expel the feelings of nature : before leaving Yarmouth, 
they published to the world the grounds of their removal, 
and bade an affectionate farewell to the Church of Eng- 
land, and to the land of their nativity. ' Our hearts,' say 
they, ' shall be fountains of tears for your everlasting 
welfare, when we shall be in our poor cottages in the wil- 
derness.'" * 

Such were the feelings with which they embarked ; but 
how sad a state of things they were to witness on their 
arrival at the infant settlement no one had imagined. 
Nearly one hundred of the Colony had perished the pre- 
ceding winter. Among them was Iligginson, a graduate 
of Emanuel College, the faithful and devoted minister of 
the church of Salem, — the first settled minister of the 
Colony. Many of the living were in a sickly and suffer- 
ing condition, and nearly all were destitute of necessary 
supplies. The faith and fortitude of the new comers were 
now to be subjected to a severe trial. No time was to be 
lost in determining their places of settlement. The har- 
bors and rivers, the Charles and the Mystic, were explored. 
The Governor and several of the chartered Company 
pitched upon Charlestown as their place of settlement, 
and " the multitude set up cottages, booths and tents, 
about the town hill." f Sickness, however, had already 

♦Bancroft's History U. S., Vol. I. p. 355. " Humble Request" of the 
Company, in Young's Chronicles of Mass., p. 295 - 298. See Note C. 
t Prince's Chronology, p. 241. Sec Note D. 



13 

begun among them ; brought on in many cases by long 
and close confinement on ship board, and in others by ex- 
posure, in consequence of imperfect shelter, to a climate, 
to which they were unaccustomed, and which is subject to 
sudden and extreme vicissitudes. Such, especially, as 
had been habituated, at home, to comfort and even luxury 
were unable to withstand the trial. Delicate woman 
sunk down into the grave. The Lady Arbella Johnson, 
" celebrated for her many virtues," who had come, in the 
language of an early chronicler,* " from a paradise of 
plenty and pleasure, in the family of a noble Earl, into 
a wilderness of wants," unable to support the hard- 
ships of her situation, ended her days, soon after her 
arrival, at Salem, and was there buried, where no stotie 
has ever marked her grave. Her husband, for wisdom and 
piety esteemed as one of the first in the Colony, called by 
Dudley, f at the time, " the greatest furtherer of this 
plantation," borne down by his sorrow, survived her but 
a few weeks, and died at Boston. " He was," says Win- 
throp, " a holy man and wise, and died in sweet peace, 
leaving some part of his substance to the Colony." :|: 
Around the place of his interment was formed the first 
burial ground ; the one that adjoins the Stone Chapel. It 
has been said that he was mainly instrumental in causing 
the settlement of Boston, and its selection as the metrop- 
olis. One after another of the settlers, almost daily, 
dropped away. Not less than two hundred died before win- 
ter. Some, it is true, of weaker faith or less fortitude, re- 
turned, disheartened, to England ; but, as for the rest, their 
sufferings only added new power to their faith and fortitude. 

* Hubbard. t Letter to the Countess of Lincoln, 
t Savage's Winthrop, Vol. I. p. 34. 



14 

In the midst of these trials, alarm was created by the 
report of a combination among the aborigines to cut them 
oft", or drive them from the country. I3y the ordering of 
Providence, in mercy to the Colony, a fatal malady so 
reduced their enemies as to oblige them, if they had 
entertained, to abandon the design. So great mortality, 
indeed, had spread among the Indians a few years before 
the Pilgrims came, as to break down the strength of 
several of the tribes in the Massachusetts Bay. Numerous 
and warlike tribes remained, as the Narragansetts, Pe- 
([uods, and others ; but they were somewhat remote : the 
day had not come for conflict with them. 

Here it is proper to remark, that the principle, by 
which the founders of the Colony were uniformly gov- 
erned, of recognizing the Indians' title to the soil, and 
obtaining from them a fair rehntiuishment, has not been 
sufficiently understood. Positive instructions were given 
to Endicott by the company in England, immediately after 
they had obtained the royal charter, that, " if any of the 
salvages pretend right of inheritance to all or any part of 
the lands granted in our patent, we pray you endeavor to 
purchase their title, that we may avoid the least sciniple 
of intrusion." * And, again, it is particularly enjoined, 
that " pubhcation be made that no Avrong or injury be 
olfered, by any of our people, to the natives." f The 
memory of "William Penn is held in lasting honor for his 
pacific policy towards the Indians ; but half a century 
before he occupied the banks of the Delaware, the Colo- 
nists of Massachusetts Pay proclaimed the principle as 
tlicir own, — and where is the instance of a departure from 

* Conipany'3 lustructions, in Young's Chronicles of Mass., p. 159. 
tibid, p. 172. 



15 

it ? — to take no lands from the natives except by fair 
purchase. The instructions to Endicott were faithfully 
carried out. To this point we have the testimony of 
a most accurate historian, that " the first settlers of the 
Massachusetts and Plymouth made conscience of paying 
the natives, to their satisfaction, for all parts of the terri- 
tory which were not depopulated, or deserted and left 
without a claimer." * Hostility with the Indians was 
occasioned by other causes, springing, sometimes, from 
private quarrels having no reference to land titles, and 
instigated, at others, by enemies, open or concealed, to 
the principles and success of the Colony. 

Besides Salem, Charlestown and Boston, settlements 
were made at Dorchester, Roxbury, Watertown, Newtown 
or Cambridge, and a few other places. To the excellent 
and honored Governor AVinthrop was granted the farm, 
which, from that day to this, has been called the " Ten 
Hills," on the South side of Mystic river ; and to 
Matthew Cradock, the first Governor under the charter, 
who, though not coming himself, had largely adventured 
in the plantation, and had sent over agents and servants, 
was granted a tract of land containing about twenty-five 
hundred acres, which has been supposed by some to 
have been within the limits of the present town of Maiden, f 
This is undoubtedly a mistake. It was the eastern por- 
tion of the present town of Medford, extending from the 
river Mystic across the plains to the hills upon the north ; 
on part of which land was " empaled," by Cradock's agents, 

* Plutchinson's Massachusetts Bay, Vol. II. p. 266. 

t Savage's Note on Winthrop. Young's Chronicles, p. 313: Note. 4. 
Dr. Young, singularly enough, refers to the " very thorough note " of 
Frotliingham, in History of Charlestown, p. 89-93, Avhich proves Cra- 
dock's plantation to have been in ]\Iedford. 



16 

a " park for deer," and, on another, ship building was com- 
nienced, and prosecuted with success, at a very early day. 

For most of the winter succeeding the arrival of Win- 
throp and the fleet, destitution and suffering among the 
colonists conthiued ; the cold proved extreme ; provisions 
were scanty ; the poor were Avretchedly lodged ; " many 
were obliged to Uve upon clams, muscles and other shell fish, 
with ground nuts and acorns instead of bread ; " * but still, 
under these gi'cat deprivations, they were able to thank God, 
" who had given them to suck of the abundance of the seas, 
and of treasure hid in the sands." f Having appointed a 
fast, and a vessel arriving, with provisions, a short time be- 
fore the day, " they turned their fast into a thanksgiving." 

The succeeding year proved favorable to the Colonists. 
The scarcity they had experienced induced greater efforts 
at tillage ; the season was propitious ; the harvest abun- 
dant. Notwithstanding all disasters, the Colony increased 
and prospered. Additions were made to the number of 
settlers by every arrival. In 1633, the emigration from 
England to Massachusetts became so large as to create 
alarm in the Government, and call forth an order of the 
king, in council, to arrest it. The tide may, for a short 
time, have been checked a Uttle, but the effort to stop it 
was of no avail. Vessels continued to arrive here, all 
summer ; " twelve or fourteen in a month." The eminent 
ministers. Cotton, Hooker, and Stone, arrived this year. 
In 1()35, came over a fleet of twenty vessels, bringing 
three thousand colonists ; among the number were eleven 
ministers, and two individuals afterwards conspicuous as 
martyrs to the cause of English liberty, — Hugh Peters 
and Sir Henry Vane. 

* Ilutehinson's Hist. Mass., Vol. I. p. 23. t Ibid. 



17 

The number of freemen in the Colony having so in- 
creased as to render it " impracticable to debate and 
determine matters in a body," * the towns agreed, as early 
as 1634, to send deputies to a General Court, and thus 
was established the Representative branch of the Legisla- 
ture, which soon after came to constitute a distinct and 
separate House, having a negative upon the Magistrates. 

But I must pass more rapidly on. The Governor and 
assistants were chosen by the votes of the whole body of 
the freemen, and, by these votes, the wise and faithful 
Winthrop was re-elected, from year to year, to the 
chief magistracy, with now and then an intermission de- 
signed principally to guard against a precedent, which 
might lead to a Governor for life ; with a few intermis- 
sions, he was continued in the office, from the time he 
came over with the charter, to 1649, the year when he 
died, worn out by the cares of the infant Commonwealth, 
and severe personal and private trials ; worn out by care 
and trial, though blessed beyond most men, in being not 
only the " father of the Colony," but the founder of a 
family honorably distinguished in each generation, and 
having a representative in our day to preside over the 
councils of the Nation. 

During the above period of nineteen years, between the 
first settlement of Charlestown and the incorporation of 
the town of Maiden, the greatest obstacles to the success 
of the Colony had been overcome. That, in the many 
severe trials to which they were at times subjected, in the 
difficult, and deUcate,and complicated questions presented 
for their adjudication, the Colonists should always have 
acted with an intelligence, a wisdom, and an enlarged 

Hutchinson's Hist. Mass., Vol. I. p. 36. 
3 



18 

chanty, two centuries in advance of the most enlightened 
nation in the ^vorld, ^vould hardly seem to be a very rea- 
sonable expectation. Yet the censures ■v\hich have so 
often been cast upon the Puritan founders of New Eng- 
land have implied as much ; nay, more, they have implied, 
on the part of their authors, a misapprehension, to use the 
mildest term, of the true merits of the question, — of the 
substantial facts in the case. Having been persecuted at 
home, and driven to seek an asylum here, our ancestors 
had the right, nay, it was their duty, to adopt the measures 
■which Avere necessary to protect themselves ; to guard 
against secret as "well as open enemies ; against intruders 
and revilers, whose insidious purpose was to break down the 
authority of the magistrates, destroy the characters and 
influence of the clergy, interrupt public worship on the 
Lord's Day, outrage the moral sense and disturb the peace 
of society. No harsh measures were resorted to whenever 
mildness would avail. But, with those, who, after repeated 
admonition, obstinately persisted in obtruding themselves, 
and setting all authority and the moral sentiment of the 
community at defiance, our fathers were compelled, by the 
necessity of self-protection, to deal with a strong hand. 

In the midst of these difficulties, the danger was, at 
times, imminent, of a revocation of the charter ; special 
commissioners being appointed to regulate the affairs of 
the Colony, and a General Governor being talked of to 
be in the interest of the Crown. And here was afforded 
an early opportunity for the display of the independent 
spirit of the colonists. Indications were exhibited, too 
plainly to be mistaken, that in such measures they would 
not tamely acquiesce. Fortunately the experiment was 
not attempted ; King Charles himself becoming so involved 



19 

in disputes with his people and parliament as to be obliged 
to let the Colony alone. To let the Colony alone, — 
this was all that the colonists desired. They asked no 
favor of the royal government ; or no other than the favor 
of neglect. They had resources of their own, sufficient 
for their reliance. They had come to plant and settle 
here, wholly at their own cost ; and, left to themselves, 
they were just beginning, i;nder the smiles of heaven, to 
make the wilderness and the solitary place to be glad, and 
the desert to rejoice and blossom as the rose. 

In the first ten years, twenty-one thousand two hundred 
settlers had arrived ; or about four thousand families. 
They came in one hundred and ninety-eight vessels ; and 
it seems a remarkable providence, that, out of the whole 
number which sailed, only a single one was lost. They 
came at their own charges. The cost of the transporta- 
tion, with " their goods, the stock of cattle, provisions 
until they could support themselves, necessaries for build- 
ing, artillery, arms and ammunition," * has been estimated, 
at what was called a " modest computation," at ,£192,000 
sterling, or $853,333. This is exclusive of what was 
paid for the original patent, said to have been £ 2,000, f 
and of all that was paid " to the Sachems of the country." 

Under the hand of industrious labor, — on land which the 
occupants held by no feudal tenure, land which they could 
call their own, the fee being in themselves, their heirs and 
assigns, forever, — the face of nature was undergoing a 
rapid change ; while civil and religious liberty struck its 
roots deep into a soil congenial to its growth, was nurtured 
by the free school and the independent church, and has 

* Hutchinson's Hist, lilass., Vol. I. p. 93, note t. 
t Ibid, Vol. II. p. 1 



20 

continued, unJur a favoring providence, to grow with a 
stroni^ trunk, and to send forth its branches to every quar- 
ter under heaven ; and it is our fervent prayer that " the 
leaves of this tree may be for the heahng of the nations." 

Before 1G49, nearly fifty towns had been settled in the 
Colony ; twenty-seven churches had been gathered ; the 
rude huts and thatched cottages of the early planters had 
given place to substantial and comfortable dwellings; the 
land was made to yield more than was required for the 
sustenance of the inhabitants ; a trade sprung up with the 
West India Islands, and other places, from which there 
was profitable return ; the furs obtained from the natives 
were exchanged for foreign manufactures ; ship building 
was commenced and prosecuted with spirit and success ; 
and navigation, commerce, and the fisheries, displayed to 
the admiring world the intelligence and enterprise of the 
Puritan Colony. 

That the rapid growth of the settlement and its advance 
over the country should have excited deep concern, in the 
bosoms of the native proprietors of the soil, was perfectly 
natural. Sagacious chieftains meditated the means by 
which they might check the intruders, or drive them oflF 
from their hunting grounds. In tliis state of feeling col- 
lision on the borders was hardly to have been avoided. 
Atrocities were sometimes perpetrated. The most formi- 
dable and hostile tribe was the Pequods, whose strength 
lay in the south-eastern part of Connecticut, and consisted 
of seven hundred warriors, who had made up their minds 
for aggressive measures. The few towns, which had just 
been settled in their vicinity by those who had removed 
from Massachusetts, were exposed to extreme danger, if 
not total destruction. A military force was promptly or- 



21 

ganized and sent against them. Their fort, surrounded by 
feeble rushwork palisades, was surprised and taken by 
assault, at early dawn ; their wigwams were set on fire ; a 
terrible carnage followed ; hundreds of Indians perished ; 
their settlements were broken up ; and, of the survivors, 
some were captured, while the rest were incorporated with 
other tribes. As a separate tribe the Pequods were ex- 
tinct. It was a fearful demonstration, at that early day, — 
only seven years after the settlement of Charlestown, — of 
the efficiency of the English arms, which filled the savages 
with awe, and secured to the colonists many years of 
peace. 

For more adequate protection in time to come, particu- 
larly to the scattered settlements ; for security against the 
Dutch on the south-western border, and against the French 
on the north and east, both of whom were manifesting a 
disposition to encroach, and were suspected of inciting the 
savages to hostility by supplying them with fire arms ; 
and for more effectual security against the various tribes, 
who were believed to be meditating a general combination 
for the extirpation of the white race from this continent, 
a union or a confederacy was formed, in 1643, of the col- 
onies of Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven, with that 
of Massachusetts, to be known henceforth by the name of 
'the "United Colonies of New England." The affairs of 
the confederacy were managed by commissioners, of whom 
two were appointed by each Colony. 

The military force of Massachusetts, at this time, con- 
sisted of twenty-six organized companies, in four regi- 
ments, one in each county, together with a troop of horse ; 
the whole under command of the Deputy Governor, Thomas 
Dudley, as Major General. Castle Island had been forti- 



90 



fied some years ; and batteries were maintained both at 
r>o3ton and Charlestown. Several of the first military 
oflicers in the colony, however, now returned to England, 
to enter into the service of the Parliament. 

Such as I have attempted to describe it was the situa- 
tion of the Colony at the time of the settlement of Maiden ; 
and to this settlement I now ask your attention. This 
tract of land, at that time, formed, as you are aware, a 
part of Charlestown which comprehended within its limits 
an area of eight miles in extent, embracing, besides what 
is now Maiden, the whole of the territory comprised in 
Reading, Stoneham, "Woburn, Burlington, West Cam- 
bridge, Mcdford, excepting Cradoek's plantation, and Som- 
erville ; also excepting the farms of Winthrop, Nowell 
and Wilson. We are to conceive of these lands, lying 
on what was called at that time Mystic side, as being cov- 
ered, like the rest of the main land, according to the 
Charlestown records, "with stately timber." "All the 
country round about " is said to have been an " un- 
couth wilderness full of timber." These lands, on Mystic 
side, were apportioned, doubtless, among the Charlestown 
settlers, accoi'ding to the rules established by the Corpora- 
tion before the Charter was brought over, which gave in 
the proportion of two hundred acres to every adventurer 
to the amount of X50, and fifty acres to every one who 
came over at his own charges. Among those to whom 
lands were thus granted, Increase Nowell, John Wilson? 
and Abraham Palmer, Avere persons of some consideration, 
who, not becoming settlers themselves on Mystic side, sold 
out to some of our ancestors.* 

Several years before 1649, there were many inhabitants 
* See Note E. 



23 

in this place. I find among the colonial papers, in the 
archives of the Commonwealth, a remonstrance to the 
General Court from the inhabitants of Mystic side, bear- 
ing date the 16th of May, 1643, against a proposed high- 
way from Winnisiramet to Reading.* 

It would be gratifying to a curiosity, not unnatural, to be 
able to identify the very spots where our fathers first 
erected their humble habitations, and the narrow and wind- 
ing roads and lanes, which were first laid out and trav- 
elled. Some indistinct traces yet remain of these ancient 
ways, and the dwelling places by which they led, though 
discontinued, some of them, a century and a half ago. 
We may form some estimate, though at best but inade- 
quate, of their plain and simple manners, and their hard 
and honest toil, in subduing a stubborn wilderness, and 
converting it into these fertile fields, which we now see 
around us clothed with so luxuriant a vegetation. 

Our fathers here, at a very early period, only thirteen 
years after the incorporation of the town, felt themselves 
much straitened for want of room. In a petition which 
they sent, at that time, to the General Court, they say, 
" the bounds of our town are exceeding streight, the most 
of our improved lands and meadows being limited about 
two miles in length, and one in breadth, and that also, 
the most part of it, by purchase from Charlestown, 
whereof we were a small branch ; from whom also we 
had all the commons we have, which is very small and 
rockie." They then speak of the great charges they are 
at for the country and the ministry, the long continued 
sickness of their teacher, with the fact that they are closely 
hemmed in by other townships, and they humbly petition 
* See Note F. 



24 

the " much honored Court," " that a tract of land of about 
four miles square, at a place called Pennycook, may be 
granted as an addition to us, for our better support and 
encouragement in the service of Christ and the country." * 
This petition, however, humble and earnest as it is, 
" the Deputies think not meet to grant." The place called 
Pennycook is now Concord, N. II., on the Merrimack 
river ; and fortunate Avas it for our fathers that their re- 
([uest was denied. For, though the chief settlers of Ipswich 
had obtained leave to remove and begin a town, now 
Newbury, at the mouth of the jNIerrimack ; and though 
" Watertown and Roxbury had leave to remove whither 
they pleased, so as they continued under this govern- 
ment," for " all the towns in the Bay," says Winthrop 
in his journal,! " began to be much straitened by their 
own nearness to one another, and their cattle being so 
much increased ;" and though sixty of the inhabitants of 
Dorchester, and one hundred from Newtown, now Cam- 
bridge, men, women and children, upon leave obtained 
from the General Court, had performed, on foot, a journey 
of one hundred and twenty miles, through a pathless wil- 
derness, Avith nothing to guide them but the compass,J 
driving before them their herds of cattle, with their effects ; 
and though they succeeded in forming settlements on the 
Connecticut river, at Hartford, Weathersfield, and other 
places ; yet, encouraged by these adventurers, had the 
early settlers of Maiden obtained their request and re- 
moved to Pennycook, they would have gone to the very 
home of a numerous and hostile tribe of Indians, who con- 
tinued, at intervals, for half a century, to attack and lay 

"* Sec Note C. 1 Savage's Wintlirop, Vol. I. p. IGO. 
t Hutchinson's Hist. Mass., Vol. I. p. 45. 



26 

waste the feeble settlements on that frontier, sometimes 
taking captive the women and children, and, at other times, 
in their murderous onsets, making no discrimination on 
account of infancy, or age, or sex. Situated here, in close 
proximity to the centre of the population and military 
force of the Colony, our fathers enjoyed, from the first, a 
protection, in the peaceful pursuits of life, which could not 
easily have been secured to them in that remote and 
exposed quarter. 

But though our fathers failed in their request for four 
miles square, or ten thousand acres of land, at Pennycook, 
their petition prevailed with the General Court to obtain 
one thousand acres, partly in Worcester and partly in 
Shrewsbury, to be " appropriated to the use and benefit of 
the ministry." This act of favor, on the part of the 
Colonial Government, it is the more grateful to record, 
from the contrast it presents to the extraordinary severity, 
with which the Maiden Church was treated a few years 
before, on account of the settlement of their first minister, 
Marmaduke Mathews, when some of the neighboring 
Churches " were unsatisfied therewith ; " — he, though a 
most pious and faithful pastor, called by Governor Win- 
throp, " a godly minister," * having made use of some ex- 
pressions, which were pronounced " weak, inconvenient and 
unsafe." The transaction is one of the most remarkable 
on record appertaining to the history of our churches. 
The defence, made by our fathers who constituted that 
Church, which, in its poverty and the feebleness of its 
infancy, was fined £50, shows that they had a clearer 
understanding of their rights as an Independent Church, 
and of the true principles of religious liberty, than the 
* Savage's Winthrop, Vol, 1. p. 273. 



26 

great body of tlic Magistrates and Deputies. It is pleas- 
ing to reflect that these extraordinary measures of the 
General Court were by no means adopted -with entire 
unanimity, nor did they meet with a cordial response from 
all the other churches. iS^ot a little comfort was imparted 
to the Church of ^lalden, in this their first and severest 
trial, by the expressed sympathy of their Salem brethren. 
I am disposed to believ^e that this grant of one thousand 
acres of land was designed, though not so expressed, as an 
acknowledgment, on the part of the General Court, of the 
injustice that was done to this Church, and as some indem- 
nity for the injury inflicted. 

It is not my purpose, for I should be trenching on 
another's province, to give an historical sketch of this 
town. But, I trust, I may be indulged in the remark, 
that the place made vacant in the pulpit of this early 
church, by the extraordinary proceeding to which I have 
referred, was soon filled by Michael \Yigglesworth, whose 
pastoral relation seems to have continued for nearly half 
a century, though the active duties of his ministry were 
suspended by sickness, as Increase Mather has informed 
us, " for some whole sevens of years." A voyage to 
Bermuda somewhat improved, but did not completely 
restore, his health. When unable to preach, he devoted 
much time to writing for the " edification of such readers 
as are for plain truths, dressed up in a plain metre." * His 
principal poetical production, entitled the " Day of Doom," 
had no small celebrity at the time, passing through several 
editions, both in England and in this country. From 
another, entitled " A Short Discourse on Eternity," I will 
recite a few stanzas as a specimen of his poetry, and of 
* Increase Mather, runcrd Sermon, preached at Maiden, June 24, 1 705. 



27 

the language in -which he clothed some of the grand con- 
ceptions of his mind : 

" What Mortal man can with a span 

mete out Eternity ? 
Or fathom it by depth of Wit 

or strength of Memory 1 
The lofty Sky is not so high, 

Hell's depth to this is small ; 
The AVorld so wide is but a stride, 

compared therewithal. 

" It is a main great Ocean, 
withouten bank or bound ; 
A deep Abyss, wherein there is 
no bottom to be found. 

****** 

" Nought joyn'd to nought can ne'er make ought, 

nor Cyphers make a Sum ; 
Nor things Finite to infinite 

by multiplying come ; 
A cockle-shell may serve as well 

to lade the Ocean dry. 
As finite things and Eeckonings 

to bound Eternity." 

He was one of the Corporation of Harvard College ; 
father of the first, and grandfather of thg second, HoUis 
Professor of Divinity in that institution. Of the regard 
entertained for him bj the town, there is ample evidence 
upon the records. Particular days were appointed when 
" all the inhabitants," as it is sometimes expressed, or 
" all the cutters and carters," as expressed at others, 
were to " cut and cart firewood for Mr. Wigglesworth." 
In addition to his stated salary of <£55, with the use of 
the parsonage, he had given him by vote " all the 
strangers' money," and "a highway was granted to his 



28 

lioiise tlirou;:^]! the town land." The moss-covered stone 
Avhich marks the spot of his hurial in 3'onder grave-jard 
bears the touching memorial of his people's love. He was 
their " physician both of soul and body." 

Methinks I can see the plain meeting-house of those 
eax'ly days standing upon that spot on my left, near to the 
parsonage bought of Benjamin Blackraan ; numerous sheds, 
or stalls for the horses, being arranged on the one side and 
on the other ; a row of them being placed by the side of this 
eminence from Avhich I now address you, whose significant 
appellation of " Bell Hock " has come down to us with the 
ti'adition, that on this summit was suspended, by some rude 
frame work, the bell, which called our fathers to the wor- 
ship of God on the Lord's Day, and the freemen of the 
toAvn to the transaction of their public business, on days 
of general town-meeting. It was not till 1693, that the 
town " voted, that the bell shall be hanged on the top of 
the meeting-house." 

There is much that is interesting in the early records, 
concerning the measures adopted for householdei's and 
masters of families to take their turns of service, for pre- 
venting disorders in the meeting-house " by the playing of 
boys and yout^;" concerning the endeavors made to 
accommodate the " Charlestown neighbors " with seats in 
the meeting-house, — there being no pews in those days, 
but seats, — for men on the one side, and for women on the 
other, — the order of seating being " the minister's rate, 
with consideration of age and dignity ; " also concerning 
the warnings repeatedly given to these same " Charles- 
town neighbors " against cutting and cartinfr off wood and 
timber from the common lands ; and, finally, concerning 
the division, by lot, of more than two thousand acres of 



29 

these lands among the seventy-four freeholders of the town, 
accordhig to the valuation of their estates, making upon 
an average about thirty acres to each man. As it 
seems to be a most creditable testimony to his fairness and 
honesty, it ought to be mentioned, that it stands on the 
record as a vote of the town, " that John Sargent, Sen'r, is 
the man to draw the lots." This general division of the 
common lands took place in 1695. Subsequently small 
portions were assigned to individuals not freeholders ; and 
to Thomas Newhall, it is recorded, was granted a part of 
the common near his own land, " he binding himself, his 
heirs and executors, to find the town -with a sufficient 
training place both for horse and foot." 

This leads me, by an obvious association, to remark, that 
the fortunes of our ancestors in this town were felt by 
them to be bound up in the fortunes of the country, and 
that they held themselves in preparation, when called upon, 
as they were from time to time, to furnish their quota of 
soldiers for the common defence. In every military expe- 
dition, indeed, of any importance, undertaken by the Gov- 
ernment, whether against the Indians or the French, the 
names of Maiden men are found upon the muster rolls, 
and, in several of the engagements, some appear on the 
lists of the killed and wounded. 

In the war against the combined Indians, called King 
Philip's war, a war instigated and conducted by that 
sagacious and ci-afty Chief, for the purpose of extermi- 
nating the Colony, but which seems to have been precipi- 
tated before he was quite prepared, soldiers from this town 
were at the attack on the Narragansett fort, in the cold 
and snow of December, 1675 ; and, of the eighty-five who 
were slain, was Edmund Chamberlin, of Maiden, and, of 



30 

the one Imndred and forty-five wounded, were Lieut, 
Phinebas Upham and James Chadwick. The Indians were 
totally routed, and it is supposed that about one thousand 
of them perished. 

In the expedition, the year following, under Capt. 
Turner, upon the Connecticut river, where the Indians 
had repeatedly attacked the towns of Hadley, Hatfield, 
and Deerfield, the last of wbicb they had entirely de- 
stroyed, — which expedition, though successful in driving 
the savages from that quarter, proved fatal to the gallant 
commander, — were several from this town, who were in the 
engagement at the Falls, now designated, from the name 
of th.e commander of the expedition, Turner's Falls, In 
the archives of State, is preserved a most affecting petition 
from ^lary Ross, of ^Maiden, to the Council in Boston, 
praying for the discharge of her husband from this war, 
he being aged and sick, and having long been in the coun- 
try's service, and his family in great distress by reason of 
his absence. It affords some insight into the suffering not 
unfrequently occasioned, in private families, by the impress- 
ments which were resorted to for recruiting the forces. 

But it was not against aggressions only from the French 
and Indians, that our ancestors felt compelled to be on 
their guard, but also against attempts on the part of the 
government of Charles II. to abrogate the charter, and 
control the Colony. The privileges, which our fathers here 
enjoyed, Avere regarded by that sovereign with no friendly 
eye. The sympathy which had existed between the 
Colony and the government of Cromwell, the neglect of 
Massachusetts promptly to proclaim the king on his acces- 
sion, the shelter here afforded to the regicides, Whalley 
and Gofic, the determination manifested to withstand any 



31 

attempt to impose upon the Colony a royal governor, were 
all remembered by a monarch, whose arbitrary principles, 
he should have been aware, made him not more dreaded 
by Republicans, than his drunkenness and debauchery 
made him abhorred by Puritans. He lent a ready ear to 
accusations against the Colony, both from open and from 
secret enemies ; and especially from one Edward E-an- 
doljDh, whose commission as Collector of the customs for 
the port of Boston had been disregarded, and himself 
treated as inimical to the interests and privileges of the 
Colony. The king sent over commissioners to hear and 
determine the matters of complaint ; a long controversy 
ensued between them and the General Court ; and their 
authority, being regarded as an infringement of the Char- 
ter, was not recognized. Decisive action, in revocation of 
the Charter, would probably have taken place immediately, 
had not domestic disquiet and alarm caused a postpone- 
ment for a few years. In 1683, by an order of Council, 
a quo warranto was issued ; and, in June of the following 
year, judgment was rendered by the high Court of Chancery 
against the Colony, " the Charter was declared forfeited, 
and their liberties were seized into the King's hands."* 

But, in eight months, Charles II. died, and the sovereignty 
passed into other hands, though not to be exercised with 
any more favor to the colonial rights. The affairs of the 
Colony were now to be administered under a President 
and Council commissioned by the King. This arrange- 
ment, however, was of short continuance. The arbitrai'y 
and obnoxious Andros was appointed Governor, with a 
Council independent of the people. The House of Rep- 
resentatives was abolished. A censorship was estabhshed 

* Hutchinson's Hist. Mass., Vol. II. p. 5. 



32 

over the press. It was declared to the Colonists, and bj 
them never forgotten, " that they must not think the 
privileges of Englishmen would follow them to the end of 
the world.'- " The people were menaced that their meeting- 
houses should be taken from them, and that public worship 
ill the Congregational way should not be tolerated." " The 
charter being vacated, the people were told that their titles 
to their estates were of no value." All property was 
regarded as insecure. " The Governor, with four or 
five of his Council, laid what taxes they thought proper;" * 
and imprisonment was the punishment for remonstrating 
against the oppression. 

Such tyranny was not long to be endured. On the 18th 
of April, 1689, the people of Massachusetts, — I venture 
to affirm that the people of Maiden were with them, — 
simultaneously rose in arms ; poured into Boston from all 
quarters ; seized and imprisoned the Governor, with llan- 
dolph and about fifty others, their partizans ; established 
a " Council for the safety of the people, and conservation 
of the peace ;" f and appointed the venerable Bradstreet, 
then at the age of eighty-seven years, their President. 
Thus was established a provisional government. The towns 
were then called upon to choose delegates to an Assembly, 
or what we should now call a Convention, to whom the 
f[uestion was to be submitted of the resumption of the 
Charter. 

The action of the town of Maiden, at this important 
juncture, is recorded in the archives of the Common- 
wealth ; — it is worthy to be there recorded, — and is as 
follows : 

* Hutchinson's Hist. Mass., Vol. I. pp. 355, 350, 359, 361. 
t Hutchinson's Hist. Mass., Vol. I. p. 381. 



83 

" May 6, 1689. At a Town Meeting of the Inhabi- 
tants of INIalden ; 

"Voted, agreed, and declared, by the Freeholders and 
Inhabitants of the town of Maiden, that we do desire and 
expect that our honored Governor, Deputy Governor, 
and Assistants, elected and sworn by the Freemen of this 
Colony, in May, 1686, together with the Deputies then 
sent down by the respective towns to the Court then 
holden, and which was never legally dissolved, shall con- 
vene, resume, and exercise the Crovernment as a General 
Court, according to our Charter, on the 9tli day of this 
inst., May; and, in so doing, we ho hereby promise and 
engage to aid and assist them to the utmost of our power, 
with our persons and estates. 

" Ensign Jos. Wilson, and Henry Green are chosen by 
the town to carry this writing to the Council. 

" As attest, John Sprague, 

John Green."* 

The Representatives of fifty-four towns met in Boston, 
and, pending the question of a resumption of the, Govern- 
ment, the joyful tidings arrived of the Revolution in Eng- 
land, and the accession, to the throne, of William and Mary. 
Demonstrations, such as had never been witnessed here, 
were now made of the popular joy. The Colony was 
regarded with favor. Authority was granted for the 
exercise of the Government under the old Charter, until 
a new one should be settled. An order was received, also, 
for Andros and other persons in confinement to be sent 
to England. 

* The above is copied from the Colonial papers in the office of the 
Secretary of the Commonwealth. The leaf coutaiuing it is missing 
from the ToA^Ti Records. 



34 

A new Charter, in a short time, was granted ; the two 
Colonies of Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay were united 
as one Province ; and Sir WiUiam Phipps was appointed 
the first Governor. This is known as the Charter of 
"William and Mary, — the Charter of 1692, — and under 
it the Government was carried on until subverted by the 
American Revolution. 

Having now dwelt with considerable fulness upon the 
events attending the early colonization of Massachusetts, 
and the circumstances of the abrogation of the Colonial, 
and grant of the Provincial, Charter, connected with those 
topics supposed to be of most interest during the first half 
century from the settlement of Maiden, I must content 
myself with a very cursory survey of the ground that 
remains ; touching only upon a very few points in the 
history of this town, besides those which are connected 
"with the affairs of the Province. 

It was in the early part of the last century, that they 
to whom I have alluded as the " Charlestown neighbors," 
and who had, for many years, united with the inhabitants 
of Maiden in public worship, aiding in the minister's sup- 
port by a free-will oflering, were set ofi" from Charlestown 
by the General Court, first for ministerial and school pur- 
poses, and, in a few years after, for all purposes what- 
ever, to be incorporated with the rest of the town. 

The original mecting-housc having now stood for nearly 
eighty years, and undergone repeated repairs and enlarge- 
ment, it was decided that a ncAv one should be erected, 
and the question of its location gave rise to a controversy 
the most unfortunate in which the town has been en- 
gaged, and which was finally settled only by order of the 
Legislature, and a decree of the Supreme Court. The 



35 

breach, however, between the disaffected parties was not 
healed, and, in a few years, the south part of the town 
was set off, bj the General Court, as a distinct precinct or 
parish ; and so continued for nearly sixty years, when, all 
differences being adjusted, there was a dissolution of the 
south parish, and a happy reunion with the rest of the 
town. 

But, notwithstanding this unhappy division for a time, 
the town did not fail to act together as one man, on all 
those questions in which the rights and liberties of the 
Province were concerned. All minor, sectional, parochial 
differences were forgotten, when, in 1731, the town was 
called on to take some action in reference to the long con- 
tinued and angry dispute, between the Royal Governor 
and the Provincial House of Representatives, respecting a 
fixed and permanent salary for that functionary. The Gov- 
ernor, under the first Charter, had been annually elected 
by the freemen of the Colony, and no difficulty at any 
time arose in regard to the compensation for his services. 
But, under the Charter of William and Mary, the Gover- 
nor was appointed by the Crown, and would have been 
independent of the General Court and the people, had it 
not been for his salary, for which he was dependent on an 
annual grant by the House of Representatives. The King 
was urgent in his instructions that an honorable and per- 
manent salary should be settled upon him, and the House 
were determined to keep him dependent upon their volun- 
tary grant ; being willing, however, to pledge themselves 
to make that grant liberal from year to year. At times 
the controversy was attended with considerable asperity, 
increased often by the extent to which the Governor exer- 
cised his negative in regard to appointments for the Coun- 



36 

c'll. It was at length declared by authority of the King, 
that, if the Assembly continue to refuse compliance Vith 
his Avill, " his Majesty ^\i\\ find himself under a necessity 
of laying the undutiful behavior of the Province before 
the Legislature of Great Britain, as it manifestly appears 
that this assembly, for some years last past, have attempted, 
by unwarrantable practices, to weaken, if not cast oif, the 
obedience they owe to the Crown, and the dependence 
which all colonies ought to have on their mother coun- 
try." • 

But the House were not intimidated. They remained 
inflexible in their purpose ; though fears were entertained 
by many that the chartered rights of the Province would, 
in consequence, be taken away. 

When, at this time, the question was submitted here, in 
Maiden, in General Town Meeting, it was voted, and, for 
aught that appears, without a dissenting voice, " that the 
town will stand for their privileges according to the Char- 
ter." 

The same watchful jealousy for the preservation of their 
privileges is seen in the vote of the town, upon the plan 
proposed, for a Union of the Colonies, to resist the threat- 
ened encroachments of the French ; who had extended 
a chain of forts, on the back of New York, Pennsylvania 
and Virginia, reaching from the St. Lawrence to the Ohio 
river. This Union, as projected, was to be formed of 
delegates, chosen by the several Provincial Assemblies, to 
be under a President appointed by the Crown ; — the 
President to have a negative upon all their acts ; and these 
acts to be further submitted for approval to the King. It 
was to be a Confederation of these Colonies, under the 

* Hutcbinson's Hist. Mass., Vol. II, p. 372. 



37 

control of the King, for purposes of peace and war ; for 
the regulation of trade with the Indians ; for the purchase 
and disposal of lands for settlement ; for the maintenance 
of an army and navy ; and for the levying of duties and 
taxes for the above mentioned purposes. 

This plan for a Confederation, however strong were the 
reasons which induced the Convention, by whom it was 
formed, unanimously to recommend it, met with no favor 
from the Colonial Assemblies, on account of the vast power 
it would vest in the King. 

" At a public town meeting, in Maiden, Jan'y 29, 1754, 
Benj. Hills, Moderator : The question was put, — Whether 
the town do esteem that the scheme for a plan of Union 
of his Majesty's colonies, on the continent, (lately consid- 
ered and debated on by the General Court,) would be 
likely to be beneficial to this Province ? And it passed in 
the negative." * 

The plan was rejected by the several Colonial Legisla- 
tures, because rejected by the peo23le in their primary 
assemblies. 

But, though opposed to this plan of Union, the people 
of this town were prompt, at all times, to aid the Govern- 
ment, by men and money, in the common object of repel- 
ling the encroachments of the French. In that brilliant 
exploit, the capture of Louisbourg, in 1745, a place so 
strong as to be called the " Dunkirk of America," and 
which was eifected, to the astonishment of Great Britain, 
by Provincial troops, more than three thousand of whom 
were furnished by Massachusetts, it may be safely affirmed 
that this town was fully represented, f Soldiers from this 
* Town Records. 

t The Muster rolls of the Massachusetts forces engaged in this expe- 
dition are not to be found in the arcliives of the Commonwealth, 



88 

town were with the troops of the Province in the expedi- 
tion against Nova Scotia, in 1755 ; and the names of at 
least twelve Maiden men, of whom four were officers, 
appear on the rolls of the array in the expedition to 
Crown Point, the same year ; some of whom were in the 
sharp engagement with the enemy under Paron Dieskau, 
on the 8th September, near the south end of Lake George. 

In the great exertion made by the Province, in 1757, 
when it was determined to raise an army of seven thou- 
sand men from Massachusetts for the Canadian frontier, 
and, twenty-five hundred being wanted to complete that 
number, resort was had to draft and impressment, the 
town of Maiden voted to pay a bounty of c£10 to every 
man who should be drawn for the expedition. They 
formed a part of that army of sixteen thousand men, 
obout one half regulars, the greatest military force that 
had then been embodied on the continent, which was 
placed under the command of Gen. Abercrombie for the 
reduction of the strong fortress of Ticonderoga. The 
attempt was unsuccessful and disastrous. That officer 
was superseded by Gen. Amherst ; the fortunes of the 
war were changed ; five thousand more troops were ordered 
by Massachusetts ; Maiden again responded with her 
quota ; the French fortresses were captured ; Quebec and 
Montreal fell into the hands of the English and Provincial 
army ; and thus was effected, mainly by the valor of the 
Provincial troops, the entire reduction of Canada. 

Strong hopes had been entertained that the conquest of 
Canada would be followed by peace and security, and that 
the fervent prayer of every American heart was now to be 
answered, in that " every man should sit under his vine 



39 

and under his fig-tree, "with none to make him afraid." 
But the events of these few years had opened the eyes of 
Great Britain to the growing importance of these Colo- 
nies ; and now was commenced that series of ill-advised 
and oppressive measures, which eventuated in their total 
separation from Great Britain, and the establishment of 
their Independence. 

This brings me down to comparatively recent times. I 
refrain from an account of that memorable struggle with 
the parent country. You are all familiar with the story 
of the Revolution. You have heard it from the lips of 
your fathers and grand-fathers, who were eye-witnesses 
and actors in the scenes. 

It is a pleasing and grateful duty to remark upon the 
evidence that exists, that the people of Maiden were not 
behind those of any town in patriotic eflforts, in proportion 
to their means. Their votes in town meetings, as they 
stand upon the records, — their instructions to their Rep- 
resentatives, — their determination to resist the execution 
of the stamp-act and all measures of British taxation, — 
their refusal to purchase goods of particular individuals 
importing contrary to the agreement of the merchants, — 
their concurrence in the measures taken to prevent the 
consumption of tea until the revenue acts should be 
repealed, — these, and various resolutions of the town in 
sympathy with and support of Boston, in the hour of her 
distress, — their concurrence and assistance in the meas- 
ures of the Provincial Congress, — and the declaration of 
their readiness to defend their rights with their blood and 
treasure, — all afford proof of their ardent and sincere 
attachment to the cause of American Liberty. 

For a considerable period before the commencement of 



40 

the contest, as is apparent, tlie nature of that contest had 
been distinctly foreseen by the people of this town. They 
commenced and vigorously prosecuted their military pre- 
parations. The officers were ordered " to make a critical 
review of the arms, ammunition and accoutrements of every 
inhabitant ; " to exempt none from military duty under 
sixty years of age, unless exempted by law, and to parade 
and drill the company twice a week. 

On the memorable 19th of April, 1775, Capt. Blancy's 
company of seventy-five men promptly marched " to re- 
sist the ministerial troops ; " and, on the 17th of June, they 
were stationed, in pursuance of orders, at Beacham's 
Point, as an attack from the enemy was apprehended 
there ; and, from that point, they Avere near spectators of 
the sanguinary conflict of that day. 

On the 19th of June, the town took measures to compel 
those inhabitants of Boston and Charlestown, who had here 
sought refuge from the impending storm, to do military 
duty with the inhabitants of this town, for the common 
defence. 

On the 21st of June, application was made to the Pro- 
vincial Congress for directions in the use of the Artillery, 
for authority to enlist men to use them, and to request 
assistance from the army for the defence of the town, in 
the very dangerous situation of the south part, particu- 
larly, which lay within reach of the enemy's guns on the 
heights of Charlestown. 

The people of this town were familiar with the danger, 
and were able to count the cost, when they gave their 
Instructions to their Kepresentative, in 177G. 
With their sentiments, as expressed in these Instructions, 
ill regard to their relation to the parent country ; the warmth 



41 

of the affection toward her which they had once felt ; and 
the causes which had produced a change, and led them to 
desire a separation and the establishment of an American 
Republic ; you have been made as familiar as with house- 
hold words. The force and eloquence, with which those 
sentiments were expressed, attracted the attention of Chief 
Justice Marshall, who deemed a portion of them to be 
■worthy of a place in his " Life of Washington." * To 
the Continental Congress they gave the assurance, that, if 
America should be declared to be a " Free and Indepen- 
dent Republic," they " will support and defend the meas- 
ure, to the last drop of their blood, and the last farthino- 
of their treasure." 

This was no empty boast. Their blood and treasure 
were liberally poured out in redemption of their pledge. 
They were connected with the army, and shared in its suc- 
cesses and reverses, from the beginning to the end of the 
war. On the roll of the eight months men are the names 
of forty-six from the town of Maiden, and it is believed 
a much larger number were among the enlistments for the 
period of the war. As bounty for soldiers to recruit the 
army, from time to time, and for supplies, the town raised 
but little short of X 10,000, in the currency of the times, 
or nearly $2,000, of the standard of silver, and this at 
a period which is without a parallel in the country for de- 
rangement of the currency, and pecuniary distress, f On 
a single occasion, to meet an urgent call for ten men to 
join the army of Washington, the town voted to raise, as 
a bounty for them, six hundred dollars in silver, five hun- 
dred of which were ordered to be collected and paid in 
ten days. 

* Vol. II. p. 407, sq. Phil. Ed. 1804. t See Note H. 
6 



42 

How great was that pecuniary distress, which the people 
of Maiden suffered, in common with the country, before the 
close of the war, some idea may be formed from the very 
touching memorial, which they sent to the General Court, 
in January, 1782, on the inability of debtors to meet the 
demands of creditors, and praying the interposition of 
Government, that executions may he stcnjed? In that 
memorial they say, that many have " lodged their money 
in the public funds, with a view to public as well as pri- 
vate advantage. Of this money they cannot now avail 
themselves ; and is it just, that men should be distressed 
and ruined, whose inability to satisfy the demands of their 
creditors proceeds only from the inability of Government 
to pay their debts to them ? Is it reasonable, that a man 
should be compelled to sell the inheritance of his fathers 
for a trifle, or be hurried into a gloomy prison, who is a 
creditor to the Government for a larger sum, than he is a 
debtor to any man upon earth ? " * It may be of interest 
to you for me to state, that the Chairman of the Commit- 
tee, who reported this memorial, was Ezra Sargent, the 
Representative of the town. 

But the cloud which hung over the minds of men, and 
cast its dark shadow over the country, was ere long rolled 
away. The heavens brightened with a glorious promise. 
The words of the Hebrew sage were verified, that " the 
race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong." 
There is a righteous Providence which overrules the affairs 
of nations as of individual men, and, in " firm reliance on 
the protection of that Providence," our fathers struggled, 
and were sustained. Success crowned their efforts. The 
object, worthy of all the sacrifice, was attained. 
* Town Kecords. 



48 

Fellow Citizens : — I trust it may have been, in some 
degree, apparent, from this address, that it was the Spirit 
of Liberty, civil and rehgious, taking its rise with our 
Puritan Ancestors, which inspired them in their resistance 
to the arbitrary and oppressive measures of the English 
hierarchy ; which led them to cross the ocean, and seek 
an asylum here for the enjoyment of their rights ; which 
nerved them to withstand the trials incident to a remote 
colony, dependent upon its own resources, in a wilderness, 
and surrounded by enemies ; which laid the foundations of 
the Commonwealth in the Free School and Independent 
Church ; which, with a jealousy that never slumbered, 
guarded from encroachment the rights conferred by Char- 
ter ; and which conducted, finally, to national Indepen- 
dence, and the establishment of our glorious Union and 
Constitution. 

Through the whole series of events leading to this grand 
consummation, it has been my object to show that our an- 
cestors, in this town, have performed their part, from the 
time of their first settlement here. By the sentiments 
they publicly expressed, and the acts they performed, they 
aided, at all times, in sustaining the rights of the Colony 
and Province ; and, in the Revolutionary struggle, they 
were second to none in patriotic eflfort, and personal sac- 
rifice ; while the declaration of their sentiments has gained 
a place in American History. 

And now contemplate the result ! Our Commonwealth 
is one of a family of nations. Two generations have 
passed away. The original thirteen have increased to 
thirty States ; and three millions of people have multi- 
plied to more than twenty millions ; while our boundaries, 
realizing the terms of the original patent, now stretch 



44 

from sea to sea, — literally an Ocean-bound Republic ; — 
a vast Confederated Eepublic ; -which, in its institutions 
of Government, state and national, — in the intelligence 
of its people, — in its moral and physical energy, — in its 
exhaustless resources, — in the elements it possesses of 
power and prosperity, and of peace and happiness, — pre- 
sents a spectacle, -which may be said, without exaggera- 
tion, to bo the admiration, as it ia the hope, of the world. 

Cherishing common memories of the past, and sharing 
in common hopes ; bound together by a common lan- 
guage, a common interest, a common polity, and a com- 
mon liberty, purchased in a contest successful only through 
united effort ; may the people of these United States 
cherish a fraternal sympathy ; and, amid all the convul- 
sions of the elements, whether moral or political, may they 
cling to that ark of their safety, — the AmepxICAN Union. 

Think of the position which this Eepublic occupies in 
the eyes of the nations struggling for Liberty, — long 
struggling, — with alternate hope and despair ; and then 
answer the question, — Can he be a friend to the best 
interests of his country, or his race, who Avill say or 
do aught that is intended to weaken the ties of our 
Confederacy 't 

It is a priceless inheritance which our fathers have 
bequeathed ; and we, their children, must be ungrateful to 
God, and recreant to the blood that flows in our veins, if 
we fail to perform our part to transmit it unimpaired to 
our posterity. 

Here, on this continent, which had lain in the silent 
repose of nature for more than thirty centuries, while 
kingdoms were rising and going down over the other three 
quarters of the globe, a nation, in the fulness of time, has 



45 

been brought into being by the Providence of the Al- 
mighty ; ,in its youth its sinews have been girt with the 
strength of maturity ; and it is advancing in its career 
•with gigantic strides. Does any thing for a time retard, 
nothing can stop, its progress. Every pause seems but 
a breathing time to accelerate its onward march. And, — 
to its destiny, what human power or prescience can set the 
bounds ? 

At a time when nature herself seems to be bowing to 
the will of man, and placing her most mysterious agencies 
at his service to do his bidding ; to carry him over the 
earth with the fleetness of the wind, and transmit his 
thoughts and volitions to the most distant places with the 
velocity of the lightning ; and when every new power ac- 
quired by him does but increase his capacity for acquisi- 
tion ; what imagination can conceive, or tongue adequately 
express, the destiny, which even here upon earth seems 
awaiting the human race ! 

Following the example of our ancestors, in devout recog- 
nition of the Divine Superintendence ; regarding ourselves 
as Trustees, with a Commonwealth in our keeping, which 
they founded in the virtue and intelligence of the people ; 
and bearing in mind the great truth, that virtue and in- 
telligence are the only true basis for a nation's prosperity 
and happiness ; may we carefully preserve and hand down 
the precious deposit, — so " that the generations to come 
may know the God of their Fathers, and serve him with 
a perfect heart, and a willing mind." 



NOTES. 



Note A. — Page 6. 

The application intended by Macaulay of this remark is not perfectly 
apparent. Few English writers can do justice to the character of the 
Puritans. The statements of one, who writes in such an off-hand 
style, require some qualification in order to be consistent either with 
truth or one another. For example, speaking of the " Puritans in the 
days of their power," he says, 

" They proved as intolerant and as meddling as ever Laud had been. 
They interdicted, under heavy penalties, the use of the Book of Com- 
mon Prayer, not only in churches, but even in private houses. It was a 
crime in a child to read by the bedside of a sick parent one of tliose 
beautiful collects which had soothed the griefs of forty generations of 
Christians. Severe punishments were denounced against such as should 
presume to blame the Calvinistic mode of worship. Clergymen of 
respectable character were not only ejected from their benefices by thou- 
sands, but were frequently exposed to the outrages of a fanatical rab- 
ble," &xi.—Hist. of England, Butler ^- Co., Phil., 1849. Vd. I. p. 118. 

How is the foregoing to be reconciled with the following passage 
referring to the Protector's administration 1 

" Justice was administered between man and man with an exactness 
and purity not before known. Under no English Government, since 
the Keformation, had there been so little religious persecution. The 
clergy of the fallen Anglican Church were suffered to celebrate their 
worship on condition that they would abstain from preaching about pol- 
itics. Even the Jews, whose public worship had, ever since the thirteenth 
century, been interdicted, were, in spite of the strong opposition of jeal- 
ous traders and fanatical theologians, permitted to build a synagogue in 
London."— 7Z)ic/. p. 102, 103. 



48 



NoTK B. — Page 10. 

" Amongst otliers that arrived at Salem, at their own cost, wore Ralph 
Sprague, ■with his brethren, Richard and William, who, with three or 
four more, by joint consent, and approbation of Miv John Endicott, 
Governor, did, the same summer of Anno 1G28, undertake a journey 
from Salem, and travelled through woods about tAvclve miles to the 
westward, and lighted of a place situate and lying on the north side of 
Charles river, fall of Indians, called Abcrginians. 

" The Inhabitants that first settled in this place, and brought it into 
the denomination of an English town, were, in Anno 1G28, as follows, 
viz. : 

" Ralph Sprague ; Richard Sprague ; William Sprague ; John Mecch; 
Simon Iloyte ; Abraham Palmer; Walter Pamcr ; Kicholas Stowcrs ; 
John Stickline ; Thomas Walford, Smith, that lived here alone before ; 
Mr. Graves, who had charge of some of the servants of the Company 
of Patentees, with whom he built the Great House this year, for such of 
the said company as are shortly to come over, which afterwards became 
the meeting-house ; and ]\Ir. Bright, Minister to the Company's sei-vants. 

" By whom it was jointly agreed and concluded that this place on the 
north side of the Charles River, by the natives called Mishawum, shall 
henceforth, from the name of the River, be called Charlestown, which was 
also confirmed by Mr. John Endicott, Governor." — Charlestown Toum 
Records. Budington^s Uist. of First Church, Charlestown, p. 172 sq. 



Note C — Page 12. 

After such a testimony, which is but one of many to be found in Ban- 
croft's History, in terms of warm admiration of the character of the 
settlers who came over in the fleet with Winthrop, it is difficult to with- 
hold an expression of surprise, that his meaning should have been mis- 
ap])rchended, in the passage, in which he speaks of " the Puritan felons 
that freighted the fleet of Winthrop." Vol. II. p. 455. Can it be sup- 
jjosed to be other than an ironical reference to the well-known calumnies 
of certain foreign writers, who have been pleased to compare the first 
settlement of New England to that of Botany Bay, and to represent the 
Puritan Pilgrims as discharged convicts and felons ? — See Young^s 
Chron. of Mass., p. 127., n. 2. Also Index, p. 565, where the above passage 
is referred to as " Bancrofts slander of the Massachusetts Colonists .'" 



49 



Note D. — Page 12. 

"1630. July. Arrive at Cliarlestown, Gov. Winthrop, Dep. Gov. 
Dudley, Sir Eichard Saltonstall, Mr. Johnson, Ludlow, Nowell, Pyn- 
chon, and Bradstreet, with the INIassachusetts Colony Charter ; as also 
Mr. Wilson and Phillips, ministers, with about fifteen hundred people, 
brought over in twelve ships from England. But many of our people 
being sick of fevers and the scurvy, we are thereby unable to carry up 
our ordnance and baggage so fiir ; the Governor and several patentees 
dwell in the Great House last year built by Mr. Graves, and the rest of 
their servants : the multitude set up cottages, booths and tents about tlic 
Town-IIill, and their meeting-place is abroad under a tree, where ]\Ir. 
"Wilson and Phillips preach. 

" On Noddle's Island lives 3Ir. Samuel IMaverick ; a man of a very 
loving and courteous behavior, very ready to entertain strangers. On 
this Island, with the help of Mr. David Thompson, hcjiad built a small 
fort, with four great guns to protect him from the Indians. On the 
south side of Charles Eiver mouth, on a point of land, called Blaxton's 
Point, lives Mr. Blaxton, where he only has a cottage ; — the neck of 
land from which the point runs, being in Indian named Shawmut, after- 
wards BosTOx. To the south-east thereof, near Thompson's Island, 
live some few planters more. These were the first planters of those 
parts, having some small trade with the natives for bever skins, which 
moved them to make their abode in those places, and are found of some 
help to the new Colony. 

" But having had a long passage, some of the ships seventeen, some 
eighteen weeks a coming, many people anive sick of the scurvy, which 
increases for want of houses, and by reason of wet lodging in their cot- 
tages, having no fresh food to cherish them. And, though the people 
are very pitiful and loving, yet the sickness Avith other distempers so 
prevails, that the well are not able to tend them, upon which many die, 
and are buried about the Hill ; yet 'twas admirable to see with what 
Christian courage many carry it amidst these calamities. 

"July 30. Friday, the day of solemn Prayer and Fasting kept at 
Cliarlestown, when Gov. Winthrop, Dep. Gov. Dudley, Mi*. Johnson, 
and the Kev. Mr. Wilson, first enter into church covenant, and lay the 
foundation of the churches both of Cliarlestown, and afterwards of 
Boston. 

"Aug. 1, Lord's Day; five more join to the Church at Charlestown, 
who, with others quickly added, choose Mr. Wilson for their Pastor ; 
the greater number, at this time, intending no other than to settle here, 



50 

where the Governor orders his house to be cut and framed. But the 
weather being hot, many sick, and others faint upon their long voyage, 
people grew uneasy for want of water ; for though this neck abounds 
with good water, yet they only found a brackish spring by the water side, 
in the sand, on the west side of the north-west field, which was not to be 
come at but when the tide was down, and could not supply half the 
necessities of that multitude : at which time the death of so many was 
thought to be owing to the want of good water. 

" This made several go abroad upon discovery. Some go over to 
Shawm ut, on the south side of the river. Some go without Charles- 
town neck, and travel up into the main, till they came to a place well 
watered ; whither Sir R. Saltonstall with Mr. Phillips and several others 
went and settled a plantation, and called it Watertown. In the mean 
time Mr. Blaxton, of Shawmut, coming over, informs the Governor of 
an excellent spring there ; withall inviting and soliciting him thither, 
upon which it seems that Mr. Johnson with several others soon remove 
and begin to settle on that side of the river." — Princes Annals, p. 240— 
244. 

Note E. — Page 22. 

The following is a literal copy of an original Deed from Abraham 
Palmer, which is still preserved, and will serve to show how vague was 
the description in conveyances of real estate made in tlie early days of 
the Colony. 

" Know all men by theise presents, that I, Abraham Palmer, of Charles- 
town, Merchant, have bargained and sould unto James Greene, of the 
town aforesd, planter, one portion of land situate and lying in :Mysticke 
field, containing, by estimation, more or less, thirty acres. Bounded on 
the south with tlic lands of John March, on the north with the lands of 
Widdow Eand, with one meadow lying by the north spring; with other 
two parcells of meadow, the one being against Mr Nowell's farm ; and 
tlie other adjoining to the land of the widow Coale. All which parcells, 
both of upland and meadowing, with all the appurtenances unto them 
belonging, that is to say, — all the houseing, timber, and all other accom- 
modations unto them, I, the foresd Abraham Palmer, being the true and 
lawful owner of them, have sould unto the aforsd James Greene, for and 
in consideration of seaventy pounds, the sd James Greene to have and to 
hould the foresd houscinge or lands, wither pastureing, meadowing, or 
broken up lands, together with all and singular the appurtenances and 
priviledges thereunto belonging ; to him and his heirs and assignes for 



61 

ever, without any disturbance or molestation. In witness whereof I 
the sd Abraham Palmei", have sett to my hand and seale this thirtieth of 
March 1647: 

Sealed and delivered ABE. PALMER (L. S.) 

in the presence of us 

Edward Mellowes. 
acknowledged the 8th, of the 9th 

mo. 1648, before me Incr: Nowell. 
Recorded 22 (12) 1648, by William Aspinwall, Recorder." 



Note F. — Page 23. 
The following is the remonstrance referred to in the text : 

"16: 3: 43. 

" To the Honored Court. 
" The humble petition of several inhabitants of Mistickside and others 
in Charlestown ; 

" May it please you to understand that there hath been lately laid out a 
highway from Winnisimmet to Reading by appointment of the General 
Court, whose orders in all things will most willingly and duly bind us 
to submit unto, assuring ourselves that their principall aim is the public 
good ; which under flvvor we consider is not consistent with the laying 
out of that way as now it is done ; for that it thwarts near twenty small 
lotts, also many other lotts ; which, if by means thereof, the owners be 
forced to fence out the way, a great part of the land must be sold to 
make the fence, the owners being many of them poor, and not able to 
bear the charge thereof, some of them having four fences already against 
common and highway ground. Wherefore our humble request is that 
the said act may be recalled, and that the way unto Winnisimmet from 
Redding may be in the highway leading toward the penny ferry, unto the 
house of James Vassell, and so by the townway leading directly unto 
Winnisimmet, lying on the head of the five acre lot by the south spring, 
which is also a plain, firm, trod way, and but little about,— the which 
they now stand charged to fence against, and cannot secure their plant- 
ing without it. So shall we be bound to pray as we desire daily to do 
for your prosperity and peace, temporal and eternal. 

Jo GREENLAND 
RICHD DEXTER 
FRANCIS WHEELER 
GEORGE HALL 

in the name of the rest." 
Mass. Archives, Vol. 121, p. 21. 



52 



Note G. — Page 29. 

Petition of Maiden for Pennycook. 
" To the HonJ Court now assembled at Boston the 7th of the 4th Mo. 
1662, the petition of the inhabitants of Maiden humbly shewing: 

" That the bounds of our town are exceeding streight, the most of 
our improved land and meadow being limited about two miles in length, 
and one in breadth ; and that also the most part of it by purchase from 
Charlestown, whereof we were a small branch ; from whom also we had 
all the commons we have ; which is very small and rockie. 

•' That hitherto we have had no inlargemcnt from the countrie, nor can 
we have any neere adjoining, being sun'ounded by sundry townships. 
That our charges to the countrie and ministiy much exceedeth sundry 
others, who have many times our accommodations, and as many here do 
know. 

" Our teacher, Mr. "Wigglesworth, also hath been long visited with verie 
great weaknesses from which it is much feared he will not be recovered. 
" For these and other weightie considerations, our most humble petition 
to this much honored Court is that a tract of lands of about foure miles 
square, at a place called Pennycooke may be granted as an addition to us, 
for our better support and incouragement, in the service of Christ and 
the Countrie ; to be laid out by Mr. Jonathan Dauforth, or some other 
artist, and Capt. Ed. Jonson or John Parker. 

" So with our hcartie prayers to God for your utmost peace and pros- 
peritie, we crave leave to subscribe ourselves, 

yr. verie humble servants, 
JOSEPH HILLS 
WILL. BRACKENBURY 
JOHN WAYTE 
JOHN SPRAGUE 
ABKA. HILL 
THO. CALL 
JOB LANE 
PETER TUFTS 
ROBERT HARDIN 

In the name of the rest. 
" The Deputies think not meete to grant this petition, 

William Tokrey Clerk." 
Mass. Archives, Vol. 112, p. 147. 

Order of the General Court as to Pennicook. 
" Upon information that Pennicook is an apt place for a township, 
and in consideration of the Lord's great blessing upon the countrie in 



multiplying the inhabitants and pLaututions here ; and that ahnost all 
such places are already taken up, it is ordered by this Court that the 
lands at Pennicook be reserved for a plantation till so many of such as 
have petitioned for lands there or at others shall present to settle 
a plantation there. 

" The Deputies have past this, desiring the consent of our Hon'l Mag- 
istrates thereto. 

WILLIAM TORREY, Clerk." 

Mass. Archives, Vol. 112,^). 147. 



Note H. — Page 41. 

The following extracts from the Order Book of the Selectmen of 
Maiden, will convey some idea of the state of the currency towards the 
close of the war. 

" An order on the treasurer to Jabez Lynde for £325, equal to $1083, 
and 2 shillings, in the first emission of Continental Dollars, for half a 
cord of pine wood; and for 125 lbs. of pork at $8 per lb. for the poor, 
as by his acct. dated Jan. 9, 1781, may appear. 
Dated in Maiden, Jan. 11, 1781. 

By order of the Selectmen, 

JOSEPH PERKINS, Town Clerk." 

" Two orders on the treasurer to John Howell, for £780, for keeping 
his sister Pell 52 weeks, at S50 of the emission of Continental Dollars 
per week. 

Dated at Maiden, March 5, 1781. 

By order of the Selectmen, 

JOSEPH PERKINS, Town Clerk." 

" An order on the treasurer to Benj'n Waitt, it being for $90 of the 
old emission of Continental Dollars ; viz. for one bushel of Indian 
corn for the poor, $30, and, for three pecks of rye for the poor, $G0. 
Dated at Maiden, March 6, 1782. 

By order of the Selectmen, 

JOSEPH PERlvINS, Town Clerk." 



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